Saturday, June 30, 2012

Like its matching neighbor No. 111 lost its exterior detailing during 20th century updating. Yet both homes retain their dignified proportions.

In 1831 James Duane’s Gramercy Farm on the east side of
Manhattan included both fields and swampy marshland. With the city inching ever northward, Samuel
B. Ruggles recognized the potential of the area and purchased land from Duane
to develop into a fashionable neighborhood of mansions ringing a central,
private park.

A year later he had drained the marsh and enclosed what
would be Gramercy Park with a heavy cast iron fence. In 1844 he began the landscaping of the park
and one by one grand residences began rising along the 60 plots that surrounded
it.

Among those mansions was the home of Judge Thomas J. Oakley
at No. 12 Gramercy Park. Oakley had
served two terms in Congress, concurrently with Daniel Webster and John C.
Calhoun. John Sergeant of Philadelphia
who served in Congress at the same time, spoke of Oakley as “the ablest
debater then to be found in that body.”

Upon leaving Congress he succeeded Martin Van Buren as
Attorney General of New York. But by now
the wealthy and highly respected lawyer was Chief Justice of the Superior Court
of New York City; a position he held for many years.

As Gramercy Park developed into the fashionable neighborhood Ruggles had envisioned, so
did the surrounding area. Directly
behind Oakley’s home were two undeveloped lots at No. 111 and 113 East 19th
Street. Around 1855 the Justice
purchased the properties and had two refined, matching row houses constructed
in the up-to-the-minute Anglo-Italianate style.

While the city was filling with Greek Revival houses with
steep brownstone stoops, Oakley’s new houses were entered nearly at sidewalk
level. A shallow set of four steps
accessed the parlor level over an American basement. The formal, dignified facades, perhaps,
reflected the Judge’s own conservative nature.
The New York Daily Tribune said of him, “He had a great abhorrence of
innovations, and may have erred in excess of conservatism.”

Robust pre-Civil War iron fencing protects the American basement.

Rigidly symmetrical, the homes rose four stories to an overhanging,
bracketed wooden cornice. Inside, rich architectural
details were intended not only to add to the luxurious surroundings of the
Judge’s tenants; but to reflect their financial and social status. These included lavishly-carved white marble
mantles, ornate ceiling plasterwork and stained glass skylights above the
winding staircase.

A graceful floral motif in a white marble mantel upstairs is carried through in the cast iron surround.

Judge Thomas J. Oakley died at the age of 74 on May 13,
1857. The family retained possession of
No. 111 until 1864. Before long it
became the home of hotel proprietor Lyman Fisk.

Fisk had been involved in the hotel business since the age
of 18. Upon arriving in New York City in
1856 he was connected with the Girard House and later became proprietor of the
Stevens House. Although he attempted to
retire in 1869, the siren song of the hotel industry proved too strong and in 1869
he purchased the Taylor Hotel in Jersey City, New Jersey. The 12-story hotel was a favorite among “sporting
men” and had a nation-wide reputation.

Light poured into the sharply-winding staircase through an oval stained glass skylight above.

The health of the aging hotelier began failing in 1880 and
he was forced, finally, to retire for good.
In December 1888 he died in the house at No. 111 East 19th
Street. His simple funeral was
conducted in the parlor on the morning of December 14. The New York Times noted that “The service
was simple and brief, in accordance with the wishes of Mr. Fisk. There were no pall bearers. Miss Fanny Davenport sent a handsome basket
of pink roses and lilies of the valley; a while shield of immortelles was the
gift of the Actors’ Fund.”

The home was purchased by another hotel proprietor, C. S.
Wehrle who ran the Belvedere Hotel at 18th Street and 4th
Avenue.

In the meantime, Judge Oakley’s daughter, Matilda, had
married William Rhinelander of the staggeringly-wealthy and socially
prestigious Rhinelander family. The
family had amassed its fortune in colonial days through sugar refining and the
retail trade. But in the first half of
the 19th century the Rhinelanders realized the greatest investment
in New York City lay in real estate.

Matilda and her husband had already purchased No. 113 when,
in 1898, they bought No. 111 from Wehrle.
Both of Judge Oakley’s speculative houses were now back in the family.

The Rhinelanders leased No. 111 as a boarding house where
well-heeled, single men found respectable lodging. In 1900 the bachelor banker Nathaniel Foote
lived here. He worked for the firm of
Moore & Schley, members of the New York Stock Exchange. Howard
W. Bartle was here at the same time; a graphic artist who designed book covers.

In 1905 Matilda Rhinelander leased the house to Miss Kate A.
Little who would continue running the boarding house; although no longer exclusively
for male tenants.

One female tenant, Maria T. Ayling, unfortunately died here
in 1911 of natural causes. Author R. R.
Whiting who was graduated from Harvard in 1900 was living in No. 111 in
1913. Three years later he would publish
his “The Judgment of Jane,” which he wrote here.

Roses and lilies twine from matching ribbon-tied bouquets on either side of a spectacularly-carved keystone.

John M. Monfort lived here in 1922. The businessman
was general manager of the architectural firm of Buchman & Kahn. Monfort found himself in the midst of an
uproar on September 15 of that year.

An outraged New York Times reported that “Gangs of young
hoodlums ran riot in various parts of the city last night, smashing
unseasonable straw hats and trampling them in the street. In some cases, mobs of hundreds of boys and
young men terrorized whole blocks.”

Swarms of youths, having decided that smashing straw boaters
would be great fun, attacked pedestrians and motorists alike. The groups
snatched the men’s hats and trampled them on the pavement, then ran full speed
to elude police.

All the while John Monfort was driving his automobile down 7th
Avenue, unaware of what The Times would the following day call “The Straw Hat
Riot.” 10-year old John Sweeney, who
lived at No. 363 West 16th Street, was among a gang of boys running
rampant along the avenue between 16th and 18th
Streets. He ran directly into Monfort’s
car, breaking his right leg.

As World War II drew to a close, No. 111 East 19th
Street became a private home again.
Having been used for nearly half a century as a boarding house, it had
never been broken up into apartments nor been seriously maltreated. On February 2, 1946 Mrs. Ann Kennedy bought
the house “for occupancy.”

Few people prefer to live in a museum and succeeding owners made renovations. The exterior lost its Anglo-Italian detailing around the windows--a common effort at updating. A remarkably-surviving mid-20th century bathroom upstairs gleams in yellow and black; and late in the century a dentist office was installed in the American basement where Lyman Fisk's cook once toiled and the intimate informal family dining room would have been.

Today the house that Chief Justic Thomas Oakley commissioned
over a century and a half ago survives as a reminder of a time when East 19th Street was developing as a fashionable residential neighborhood and the dark clouds of Civil War were still years away.

many thanks to Leslie Lalehzar for requesting this post. photographs taken by the author.

Like its matching neighbor No. 111 lost its exterior detailing during 20th century updating. Yet both homes retain their dignified proportions.

In 1831 James Duane’s Gramercy Farm on the east side of
Manhattan included both fields and swampy marshland. With the city inching ever northward, Samuel
B. Ruggles recognized the potential of the area and purchased land from Duane
to develop into a fashionable neighborhood of mansions ringing a central,
private park.

A year later he had drained the marsh and enclosed what
would be Gramercy Park with a heavy cast iron fence. In 1844 he began the landscaping of the park
and one by one grand residences began rising along the 60 plots that surrounded
it.

Among those mansions was the home of Judge Thomas J. Oakley
at No. 12 Gramercy Park. Oakley had
served two terms in Congress, concurrently with Daniel Webster and John C.
Calhoun. John Sergeant of Philadelphia
who served in Congress at the same time, spoke of Oakley as “the ablest
debater then to be found in that body.”

Upon leaving Congress he succeeded Martin Van Buren as
Attorney General of New York. But by now
the wealthy and highly respected lawyer was Chief Justice of the Superior Court
of New York City; a position he held for many years.

As Gramercy Park developed into the fashionable neighborhood Ruggles had envisioned, so
did the surrounding area. Directly
behind Oakley’s home were two undeveloped lots at No. 111 and 113 East 19th
Street. Around 1855 the Justice
purchased the properties and had two refined, matching row houses constructed
in the up-to-the-minute Anglo-Italianate style.

While the city was filling with Greek Revival houses with
steep brownstone stoops, Oakley’s new houses were entered nearly at sidewalk
level. A shallow set of four steps
accessed the parlor level over an American basement. The formal, dignified facades, perhaps,
reflected the Judge’s own conservative nature.
The New York Daily Tribune said of him, “He had a great abhorrence of
innovations, and may have erred in excess of conservatism.”

Robust pre-Civil War iron fencing protects the American basement.

Rigidly symmetrical, the homes rose four stories to an overhanging,
bracketed wooden cornice. Inside, rich architectural
details were intended not only to add to the luxurious surroundings of the
Judge’s tenants; but to reflect their financial and social status. These included lavishly-carved white marble
mantles, ornate ceiling plasterwork and stained glass skylights above the
winding staircase.

A graceful floral motif in a white marble mantel upstairs is carried through in the cast iron surround.

Judge Thomas J. Oakley died at the age of 74 on May 13,
1857. The family retained possession of
No. 111 until 1864. Before long it
became the home of hotel proprietor Lyman Fisk.

Fisk had been involved in the hotel business since the age
of 18. Upon arriving in New York City in
1856 he was connected with the Girard House and later became proprietor of the
Stevens House. Although he attempted to
retire in 1869, the siren song of the hotel industry proved too strong and in 1869
he purchased the Taylor Hotel in Jersey City, New Jersey. The 12-story hotel was a favorite among “sporting
men” and had a nation-wide reputation.

Light poured into the sharply-winding staircase through an oval stained glass skylight above.

The health of the aging hotelier began failing in 1880 and
he was forced, finally, to retire for good.
In December 1888 he died in the house at No. 111 East 19th
Street. His simple funeral was
conducted in the parlor on the morning of December 14. The New York Times noted that “The service
was simple and brief, in accordance with the wishes of Mr. Fisk. There were no pall bearers. Miss Fanny Davenport sent a handsome basket
of pink roses and lilies of the valley; a while shield of immortelles was the
gift of the Actors’ Fund.”

The home was purchased by another hotel proprietor, C. S.
Wehrle who ran the Belvedere Hotel at 18th Street and 4th
Avenue.

In the meantime, Judge Taylor’s daughter, Matilda, had
married William Rhinelander of the staggeringly-wealthy and socially
prestigious Rhinelander family. The
family had amassed its fortune in colonial days through sugar refining and the
retail trade. But in the first half of
the 19th century the Rhinelanders realized the greatest investment
in New York City lay in real estate.

Matilda and her husband had already purchased No. 113 when,
in 1898, they bought No. 111 from Wehrle.
Both of Judge Oakley’s speculative houses were now back in the family.

The Rhinelanders leased No. 111 as a boarding house where
well-heeled, single men found respectable lodging. In 1900 the bachelor banker Nathaniel Foote
lived here. He worked for the firm of
Moore & Schley, members of the New York Stock Exchange. Howard
W. Bartle was here at the same time; a graphic artist who designed book covers.

In 1905 Matilda Rhinelander leased the house to Miss Kate A.
Little who would continue running the boarding house; although no longer exclusively
for male tenants.

One female tenant, Maria T. Ayling, unfortunately died here
in 1911 of natural causes. Author R. R.
Whiting who was graduated from Harvard in 1900 was living in No. 111 in
1913. Three years later he would publish
his “The Judgment of Jane,” which he wrote here.

Roses and lilies twine from matching ribbon-tied bouquets on either side of a spectacularly-carved keystone.

John M. Monfort lived here in 1922. The businessman
was general manager of the architectural firm of Buchman & Kahn. Monfort found himself in the midst of an
uproar on September 15 of that year.

An outraged New York Times reported that “Gangs of young
hoodlums ran riot in various parts of the city last night, smashing
unseasonable straw hats and trampling them in the street. In some cases, mobs of hundreds of boys and
young men terrorized whole blocks.”

Swarms of youths, having decided that smashing straw boaters
would be great fun, attacked pedestrians and motorists alike. The groups
snatched the men’s hats and trampled them on the pavement, then ran full speed
to elude police.

All the while John Monfort was driving his automobile down 7th
Avenue, unaware of what The Times would the following day call “The Straw Hat
Riot.” 10-year old John Sweeney, who
lived at No. 363 West 16th Street, was among a gang of boys running
rampant along the avenue between 16th and 18th
Streets. He ran directly into Monfort’s
car, breaking his right leg.

As World War II drew to a close, No. 111 East 19th
Street became a private home again.
Having been used for nearly half a century as a boarding house, it had
never been broken up into apartments nor been seriously maltreated. On February 2, 1946 Mrs. Ann Kennedy bought
the house “for occupancy.”

Few people prefer to live in a museum and succeeding owners made renovations. The exterior lost its Anglo-Italian detailing around the windows--a common effort at updating. A remarkably-surviving mid-20th century bathroom upstairs gleams in yellow and black; and late in the century a dentist office was installed in the American basement where Lyman Fisk's cook once toiled and the intimate informal family dining room would have been.

Today the house that Chief Justic Thomas Oakley commissioned
over a century and a half ago survives as a reminder of a time when East 19th Street was developing as a fashionable residential neighborhood and the dark clouds of Civil War were still years away.

many thanks to Leslie Lalehzar for requesting this post. photographs taken by the author.

Friday, June 29, 2012

Joseph B. Thomas, Sr. was born in Boston in 1848 and
accumulated a fortune in the sugar business.
The energetic mogul moved his family to New York where his athletic
interests were reflected in his memberships in the New York Yacht Club, the
Sewanhaka-Corinthian Yacht Club and his presidency of the St. Andrew’s Golf
Club. Thomas would pass his love of
outdoor sports to his son, Joseph B. Thomas, Jr.

The younger Thomas would also inherit his parents’ sense of
humor. In 1901, during the flurry of December
debutante balls and teas, the society pages were filled with events in honor of
young girls being introduced to society.
And then there was the one mention of a man.

“Mr. and Mrs. Joseph B. Thomas (Miss Annie Hill) gave a
small dance last evening at Delmonico’s for their son, Joseph B. Thomas Jr.”
said The New York Times. In an apparent
tongue-in-cheek jab at the tradition, the Thomases gave a coming out for their
son that mirrored the others. “There was
a cotillion and some pretty favors. It
was a small dance. Only fifty or sixty
in all were invited, and they were of the younger set.”

Young Thomas would graduate in 1903, but before then he
already was noticed as an expert polo player, champion hurdler and a breeder of
Borzoi dogs – known as the “royal dog of Russia.” Because he was convinced that the best of
the species had never left Russia, one of the first things on his agenda upon
graduation was a trip to Russia.

There he visited all the famous kennels, finally spending
some time as a guest of the Grand Duke Nicholas at Perchina. The duke owned superior dogs and Thomas
purchased Bristri, who would go on to become champion in the United States.

He returned in 1906 to purchase more dogs and his success
led Country Life to note a year later “But the Borzoi’s vogue in the Eastern
states may be truthfully said to have only fairly begun. Joseph B. Thomas, Jr., more than any other
one man, is responsible for this.”

Thomas’s parents were living in the exclusive Hotel Savoy
when, in July 1909, Joseph B. Thomas, Sr. became ill with sarcoma. Three weeks later in August, he died.

The younger Thomas began looking for an appropriate home for
himself and his widowed mother.

In the meantime, the innovative English-born architect
Frederick Junius Sterner had come to New York from Colorado in 1906. He purchased a home on East 19th
Street where nearly identical Greek Revival residences lined the block. Built
half a century earlier, they were decidedly out of style.

Sterner remodeled his home by slathering it with colored
stucco, adding a Mediterranean-style red tile roof that extended beyond the façade,
colorful tiles and decorative ironwork.
The outmoded house was suddenly up-to-date and eye-catching.

Sterner’s transformation of the interiors were even more
startling. Architecture would note that “Mr.
Sterner believes that the interior of a living place should be primarily the
thing to be considered, the exterior coming about because of the interior
requirements, and it is in this manner than he has treated this house for his
own use.”

Among the features was an indoor garden. The magazine said “This is a great
characteristic of Mr. Sterner’s work, as in practically every example he
incorporates a garden feature.”

His work caught the eye of Joseph B. Thomas.

By the end of 1910 Sterner had reworked a rowhouse for
Thomas, just down the street from his own, at No. 135 East 19th
Street. For this project the architect
transformed the mid-19th century house into a Gothic fantasy. The stone first floor, actually entered below
street level, supported four stories of multi-colored brick, laid in a modified
Flemish bond pattern. Diamond-paned
windows topped by flat-headed Gothic eyebrows, a stepped gable that harbored
crouching gargoyles and a carved coat of arms carried out the Gothic
motif. An elaborate row of stained glass
windows behind carved tracery marked the dining room.

In 1910 Brickbuilder published a photo of the newly-renovated home (copyright expired)

Inside, no trace of the former Victorian house
remained. The living room, called “the
Italian Room,” featured a barrel-vaulted ceiling with delicate plasterwork and
an imposing stone fireplace. Carved
paneling was used throughout to maintain the period illusion. The dining room was built as a balcony to
the living room, opening onto it through a series of wooden arches. Below it all was an immense brick-and-tile
wine cellar.

Thomas’s love for fun and entertaining was evident in the
many social functions in the house. On
St. Patrick’s Day 1914 he hosted a dance and supper for which all the
decorations and even the ices were green.
The Balalaika Orchestra played Russian music (straying a bit from the
Irish theme) and Miss Clara Fargo did several exhibition dances.

The Library -- Brickbuilder 1910 (copyright expired)

Miss Fargo showed up in the society pages two weeks later
when The Sun reported that “Owing to the increased membership of Miss Fargo’s
dancing class the meetings of Tuesday nights, March 31, April 7 and April 14
will be held in the Della Robbia room of the Vanderbilt instead of at 135 East
Nineteenth Street.”

Clara Fargo, who was spending so much time at the Thomas
house, was not a mere entertainer. She
was the socially-prominent daughter of James F. Fargo, the Secretary of the
National, American and Wescott Express Companies and a Director of the Hanover
National Bank. The New York Times called
her “one of society’s cleverest dancers.”
The attraction between the Clara and Joseph was therefore natural—the same
article noted that Thomas “has entertained society frequently at musical and
costume affairs.”

Later in 1914 the committee of the British War Relief Fund,
supported by society dames like Mrs. W. K. Vanderbilt and Mrs. Arthur Burden,
decided to give a fund-raising dance.
They turned to Joseph B. Thomas and the event was held at No. 135 East
19th Street on December 16.

The Conservatory, or "indoor garden," so important to Sterner's designs -- Brickbuilder 1910 (copyright expired)

A month later the announcement was made that surprised no
one in New York society: Joseph Thomas
was to marry Clara Fargo. The wedding
took place on February 15, 1915 but was an understated affair due to the recent
deaths of Clara’s grandfather and Joseph’s brother, Ralph H. Thomas.

On July 28, 1916 Annie M. Thomas died at age 69. But
joy was back in the house a year later in October when Clara and Joseph’s son,
the new Joseph B. Thomas, Jr., was born.

The Wine Cellar -- Brickbuilder 1910 (copyright expired)

With the end of World War I Europe struggled to get back on
its feet. Farms were destroyed by
bombings and the population of farm animals had been decimated. Joseph Thomas became the New York State
contracting agent for a program to ship American cows to Europe. It seemed like a nice thing to do.

But not everyone thought so.

John T. Dooling, assistant District Attorney, protested the
program, warning it “menaces the milk situation here.” Dooling felt that the several thousand cows
being exported to France, Belgium and the Netherlands could result in American
children having no milk to drink.

“Should the milk situation be menaced by this exportation,”
he told The New York Tribune on August 15, 1919, he threatened to “notify
Federal officials and ask for action.”

photo by Alice Lum

The Thomases, however, continued with the fun-loving
ways. On February 2, 1920 The Times
reported on Clara’s participation in a fund-raising performance of Oscar Wilde’s
“The Importance of Being Ernest,” in which society women played the female
roles.

“Mrs. Joseph B. Thomas, the former Clara Fargo, who was noted
for her dancing, was Cecily Cardew and quite slim enough to be 17,” said the
newspaper.

The couple became close friends with artists Robert Chandler
and George Bellows (who also lived in a Frederick Sterner-remodeled house on
East 19th Street). Many of
the homes along the 19th Street block had now been remodeled by Sterner
and Joseph Thomas was passionate about the neighborhood. He planted plane and maple trees along the
block and introduced the gingko tree here.
For years he was president of the
Gramercy Park Association.

photo by Alice Lum

He also became an avid and accomplished fox hunter,
establishing kennels and stables in Middleburg, Virginia called Huntlands. His love for dog breeding led him to search
throughout Virginia to find red hounds descended from those presented to George
Washington by the Marquis Lafayette, and he wrote the book “Hounds and Hunting
Through the Ages.”

Finally, at 75 years old, Joseph B. Thomas died after a
prolonged illness on July 14, 1955. The
house at No. 135 was sold to advertising executive Robert B. Grady and his
wife, Irma. After fifteen years the
house, called by The Times as “one of the most ornate in the area,” was sold to
E. J. Smith with all the Grady furnishings intact.

As the 20th century came to a close, designer
Oleg Cassini owned the remarkable house.
Today it remains unchanged—a once unremarkable house that was
made truly remarkable in a 1910 make-over.

Thursday, June 28, 2012

In 1825 the streets of New York were overcrowded and unsanitary. Two years earlier the city had endured a yellow fever epidemic and now doctors noticed an outbreak of another terrifying disease: cholera.

Within two years there was a full-scale epidemic and by July 1832 thousands were dying.

Following a trend begun with the first crisis, panicked citizens with the means to do so fled northward. The New York Evening Post wrote “The roads, in all directions, were lined with well-filled stagecoaches, livery coaches, private vehicles and equestrians, all panic-struck, fleeing the city, as we may suppose the inhabitants of Pompeii fled when the red lava showered down upon their houses.”

The doorway at No. 20 retains its original 8-paneled door, handsome carved framing and overlight -- photo by Alice Lum

The wealthiest of these frightened refugees headed to the Bloomingdale area at the northern end of the island. Most went as far as the Village of Greenwich where the country air was clean and safe.

A flurry of building resulted in Federal-style homes ranging from modest working-class dwellings to refined brick mansions like Samuel Whittemore’s imposing residence.

The 19th century renovations resulted in charming, country store-like storefronts -- photo by Alice Lum

In the earliest days of the development, builder Daniel Simonson constructed two frame houses at Nos. 18 and 20 Christopher Street. Completed in 1827, the little two-story buildings were faced with brick. Entrance doors, set to the side, were ornamented with unpretentious Federal details – fanlights and delicate side columns.

Unlike the prim, formal dormers of their neighboring houses, these boasted ambitious grouped dormers. The AIA Guide to New York City would later describe them as “superdormers;” giant, arched structures that encompassed several windows each and offered nearly a full-floor of usable space in otherwise cramped garrets.

After taking this shot in June 1933, photographer P. L. Sperr wrote on the reverse "18-20 are especially prized for their quaintness." -- photo NYPL Collection

Before the turn of the century both houses were converted to accommodate commercial space on the first floor. The front walls were knocked out and in their place wood-and-glass storefronts were installed; what the authors of “One Thousand New York Buildings” describe as “perhaps the most charming to be found anywhere in New York…Their show windows and doorways are sheltered under unusual hoods.”

In 1934 shutters adorned the second floors and the large dormers had just begun to sag -- Photo NYPL Collection

Sleepy Greenwich Village changed slowly, but the old-fashioned houses at Nos. 18 and 20 Christopher barely changed at all. In 1924 the Department of Buildings described both as having a store and “non-housekeeping apartments” above.

Fantastic details include the sunburst in the "superdormer," delicate paneled pilasters framing the dormer windows, and carved brownstone lintels, now painted -- photo by Alice Lum

Nearly two centuries after being built, these two picturesque remnants of a nearly-forgotten period in Greenwich Village remain. The weary-looking over-sized dormers sag backwards with age, perhaps adding to their charm.

Throughout the past few years the Department of Buildings has fought the owners’ attempts to alter the buildings. Somehow, however, the two little houses remain, if not untouched, much-loved.

Wednesday, June 27, 2012

The Collegian Flats was the the latest in multi-family residential design in 1884.

By 1884 the quiet and respectable block of West 21st
Street between 8th and 9th Avenues was undergoing
change. The brick and brownstone
one-family homes were slowly being converted to boarding houses. And before the end of the century many of
them would be razed to make way for modern apartment buildings.

Among the very first of these would be built by the Evans
Estate at No. 345 and would be, as The New York Times put it, “dignified by the
title of the Collegian Flats.” Built for middle-class families, the
five-story building offered two roomy apartments per floor, with tall double-hung
windows for ample ventilation.

The red brick building was trimmed in stone with
up-to-the-minute Eastlake touches—a sawtooth cornice between the first and
second floors, for instance, and incised lintel carvings. The rows of windows at each level were
connected by a stone course at the sills and at the lintels, and by a decorative
floral tile band –a nice added touch. Two
semi-attached polished granite columns supported a solid stone hood over the
entrance, proclaiming that this was not another tenement building.

Bands of decorative floral tiles at each floor were a colorful added touch.

The Collegian Flats would quickly become the center of a
scandalous murder trial that started far away in a Cleveland, Ohio.

In May 1884 24-year old George W. Evans stopped at the
American Hotel in Cleveland. Across the
street was the Johnson House where Annie Belts, “a very attractive young woman,”
according to newspapers, was a guest.
Annie was the daughter of a Steubenville livery stable owner and had
argued with her parents and run away from home.

Evans flirted with Annie through the hotel windows, finally
becoming acquainted with her. What Annie
did not know was that he was also the son of Alexander Evans, a notorious
pickpocket and sneak thief also known as “Nevins,” and “the milkman.” Nor did she know he was cruel and abusive.

Evans was attracted to the young girl not only for her good
looks, but for the $40,000 of Steubenville property of which she would become
the sole heiress. He convinced Annie to
come back to New York with him and in the Fall they were married. On November 1 he was hired as janitor of the
new Collegian Flats. The couple was given the
four-room apartment in the basement.
Things seemed to be going well for the newly-weds.

Trouble soon surfaced.
The jealous husband felt that Augustus White, a partner in the
management company of the building, W. A. White & Sons, was taking too
great an interest in his wife and that she appeared to reciprocate. Quarrels ensued.

Tenants began complaining that Evans would lock himself in
the apartment with his wife and beat her.
According to The New York Times “sounds of blows and shrieks indicated
that he was chastising her, and she afterward complained that he not only beat
her, but tried to strangle her.” The
residents were, said The Times, “shocked by Evans’s brutality to his wife.”

The Sun was less sympathetic. It reported that the tenants “suggested to
the agents that he should be removed from the flats, as the woman’s cries were
annoying.”

By January Annie Evans was fearful for her life. When White called one morning and Evans was
not at home, she implored the man to help her.

“She said she had discovered that her husband, whom she married hastily,
was a villain,” White later recounted. “He
had a bad temper and had beaten her and threatened to kill her. She told me she was afraid of her life and
begged me to help her to get back to her home and friends in Ohio. Unless I did so she would be driven to killer
herself.”

A plan was hatched whereby Annie would have enough time to
pack and escape. On Wednesday, January
28, Evans was summoned to the White offices at 1:00 to discuss maintenance of
the water pipes in the building. When he
arrived, White told him he had to take care of something, but not to leave
until he returned.

White finally came back at 6:00 in the evening, apologized
and asked Evans to return the next day.
When the janitor arrived at the basement apartment, he found that his
wife had packed and left. In the morning
he was fired and told to leave.

George Evans, however, did not take losing his wife nor
losing his job easily. He spent 24 hours
searching for Annie and at one point was informed she had been seen “walking
with Mr. White.” Evans was enraged.

When he returned to the apartment on Friday night at 11:30,
he encountered the new janitor, a black man named Thomas Currie. The two got into a violent argument which was
heard on the upper-most floor. The
apartment of Edmund Coon was on the top floor and in the rear room was top of a
shaft that connected to the cellar by the coalbins. Thomas Coon, a nephew, was awakened by the
angry voices below.

“I want you to understand I’m janitor here until tomorrow;
then my time’s up. I have orders not to
let anyone in the house at night. So you
get.”

The 36-year old Currie argued that he was obeying the orders
of White to stay.

Edmund Coon, who was in the front room of the apartment at
the time, was startled by a gunshot. His
nephew told him what he had heard and the pair listened at the shaft, first
hearing groaning, then “What did you expect—that I’d let you ‘boss’ me? I had to defend myself. Do you want a doctor?”

The men rushed to the basement to find a dazed Currie at the
foot of the cellar stairs, bleeding from
the head. He was able to say that Evans
had shot him. He was taken to New York
Hospital where he died four days later.

The manhunt was on for Evans whom police described as “5
feet 9 inches in height, small side whiskers, small black mustache, black hair
and eyes, ruddy complexion, medium build, dark clothes and a derby hat.”

Assuming that Annie fled to Ohio, Evans headed there. Authorities tracked him to Cleveland, Chicago
and St. Louis; and then lost the trail.
Nearly a year would pass before Evans was caught. Detectives rented a room across the street
from Evans’s aunt who lived at No. 312 East 105th Street on a hunch
that he might return to New York.
Finally, in December, they spotted him at the window of his aunt’s
apartment.

He was arrested later on the street. In the waistband of his trousers was a
pearl-handled double-edged dagger 7 inches long. Evans confessed to the killing.

But it would not be the end of the story.

On January 21, 1886 George W. Evans appeared in court to
face his first-degree murder charge.
The Times sized him up for its readers.
“As he sat in the Court of Oyer and Terminer yesterday, on trial for
murder in the first degree, he looked very different from the typical
criminal. He had a clean-cut face, a
clear complexion, and a bright, intelligent expression. By his attire he showed himself possessed of
good taste. But there was a flippancy
about him that was not pleasant to see in the manner of a man on trial for murder.”

When Evans’s attorney, William f. Howe, stood before the
jury, the account of the killing was drastically changed. According to Howe's version, Evans had acted solely in self defense. The counsel told that when Currie was told to
leave he refused and drew a revolver.
Evans then pulled out his own gun and Currie relented, putting his in
the pocket of his overcoat. When Evans
turned to leave to summon a policeman to oust the intruder, Currie said “Now I’ll
kill you.”

But Evans was faster than Currie, recounted Howe, and his bullet stopped the
would-be murderer. When Evans realized
that the new janitor was shot, he fled because he did not have enough money
to hire an attorney to defend him.

Two days later a verdict was reached. Evans was guilty of manslaughter in the
first degree, punishable by 15 years in prison.
“He took the verdict of the jury and his sentence coolly,” said The
Times, “and without evident emotion, nor did he break down or show either the
quivering of the lip or the moistening of an eyelid when his father, mother,
and grandmother gave vent to their feelings in great sobs of grief.”

Evans’s attorney had more tricks up his sleeve, however.

When Thomas Currie had identified Evans as the shooter,
detectives were required to ask the question “Have you any hope or recovering
from the effects of the injury you have received?” The question was necessary to establish an “ante-mortem
statement;” one which was made by a person believing he was about to die.

Currie replied “It is hard for me to say.”

William F. Howe appealed to the Supreme Court. If Currie was not certain that he was going
to die, his statement could not be “ante-mortem.” Evans was granted a new trial.

In a plot twist that is inconceivable today, the General
Term of the Supreme Court set aside the verdict on June 1, 1886 on the grounds
that the dying man’s statement was not “a legal ante-mortem statement.” There was no retrial because, as reported
in The New York Times, “the only evidence against him beyond the excluded
statement of Currie is circumstantial and not strong.”

George Evans, the cruel and malicious physical abuser of his
young wife and the cold-blooded murder of Thomas Currie was a free man.

The Collegian Flats never again was the subject of such dark
publicity. Reputable tenants continued
to live here like Susanne Pallet who was here in 1911. A member of the Daughters of the American
Revolution, she was descended from John Hart who served under Captain John
Prout Sloan on the Marine sloop Enterprise in 1775.

There was, however, a bit of embarrassment when truck driver
William P. Jones was arrested for his involvement in a band of pier
thieves. John Quinn was employed as a
checker by the Lehigh Valley Railroad at Pier 30. Quinn would steal valuable freight, like
silverware, that was transported by Jones to others who would sell the goods.

But for the most part, the lives of residents at No. 345
West 21st Street like Lt. Francis E. Liszanckie of Fire Engine
Company 8 who lived here in 1951, was quiet and unexceptional.

In 1974 the building was converted from two to four
apartments per floor. Otherwise, the
prim and attractive Victorian apartment building is unchanged. Its Chelsea residents come and go unaware
that its basement was the scene of one of the most publicized murders in New
York in the 1880s.

Tuesday, June 26, 2012

In the last quarter of the 19th century the Upper
West Side exploded with development as paved streets and public transportation
made the neighborhoods west of the newly-created Central Park attractive to
middle and upper class families. While
the New York’s aristocratic old guard remained on the east side of the park,
those who had made their fortunes in fields like entertainment, for instance,
mainly settled on the west.

Such was the case with Charles L. Lawrence. Born in Scarborough, Scotland, he made his
name in the theatrical and musical circles.
For years he was treasurer of the Academy of Music—the forerunner of the
Metropolitan Opera House where owning a box was a reflection one’s social
status. Lawrence was also instrumental in
organizing several theatrical companies.

Lawrence’s home at No. 638 West End Avenue stood apart from
many of the mansions that rose along the avenue. In a stark contrast to the gargoyles and
towers of the eccentric West End architecture embraced by many of the builders,
Lawrence’s mansion was prim and distinguished.
Smacking of London’s Georgian Mayfair District, it sat on a white stone
base behind a proper cast iron fence.
The Ionic portico at street level supported a stone
balcony. Ruddy-colored brick contrasted
with the white stone window frames and trim.
At the fourth floor, bands of stone alternated with brick to create a
variegated striped effect. Above, dormers with a broken, scrolled pediments crowned the roofline.

Only two bays wide on West End Avenue, the house stretched
far back along West 91st Street.
Here a wide balcony with an elegant stone balustrade served as the focal
point. Far from the corner was the
servants’ entrance.

photo by Alice Lum

Perhaps the most illustrious time in Lawrence’s career (and
most profitable) was his management of the first two American tours of Adelaide
Ristori . The Italian tragedienne was a
European sensation and, like Jenny Lind upon her first arrival in the U.S., she
attracted huge crowds to her performances.

The Italian actress Adelaide Ristori during her first New York appearance (the photographer artificially inserted the mirror "reflection") -- photo NYPL Collection

The New York Times would later report that “During [her
first tour] she gave 349 performances, earning a fortune both for herself and
her manager.”

On July 16, 1890, Lawrence died in the house at 57 years of
age.

Lawrence’s widow sold the house to Lyman Horace Weeks, a
prolific author of books of a wide-range of topics. He penned travel books such as his “Along
the Azores,” genealogical works and books
on social and economic topics like “The Other Side—A Brief Account of the
Development of Industrial Organizations in the U.S.” Later, as the motor car became increasingly
popular, he turned his focus to writing about automobiles, including “The
Origin and Development of the Automobile.”

Following Weeks, the former Civil War officer Louis E.
Granger lived at No. 638. Granger had
started his military career as a second lieutenant in the 13th
Massachusetts Infantry. As the war progressed, he was made a captain
in the 18th U.S. Colored Infantry.

In 1897 he wrote a letter from his desk in the house on West
End Avenue in memory of the recently deceased General Henry G. Thomas. In it he reflected on his time under the
general and the extra danger that commanding African American soldiers
presented.

“It was my pleasure to serve with the General when it took
moral as well as physical courage to command colored troops. The Confederacy had issued orders not to
treat officers of colored troops as prisoners of war if captured, but to shoot
them down.”

In May 1903 attorney Orison B. Smith purchased the
house. The wealthy Smith was Vice
President and General Counsel of the Delaware, Lackawanna & Western Railroad
Company; and a partner in J. Lee Smith & Co., importers and manufacturers of
paint. Although the Smiths could easily
afford to maintain the mansion as a single-family home (both Orison and his
wife, Jennie, were club members and Orison dabbled in real estate); he took in at least one boarder.

Living in the Smith home was prominent attorney William Sherman Jenney and his wife, Nina. Jenney served under Orison Smith as general attorney for the railroad which, no doubt, was no small factor in his living here.

The college-educated Jennie H. Smith was not one to stay at
home. She had accepted the position as
a School Inspectress in 1894 (the second female in New York City to hold
the position). She was also an officer
of the International Sunshine Society.

The goal of the International Sunshine Society, which had
been formed half a century earlier, was “to incite its members to a performance
of kind and helpful deeds and thus to bring the sunshine of happiness into the
greatest possible number of hearts and homes.”
While it seemed frivolous on the surface, the Society established day
nurseries, fresh air homes, lunch rooms and free libraries.

As for dues, the women members were required to donate “sunshine
suggestions, kind deeds and good cheer.”

As the United States entered World War I the Smith household included their two daughters and a son.
Margaret Foster Smith fell in love with the dashing Edwin Norton Moore
and there were no doubt many tears from the young girl when he left town for
training in 1918 with the artillery at Camp Upton, Long Island. He then was
deployed to France with the 305th Field Artillery.

But happier times were to come when the soldier returned the
following year and on May 28, 1919 they were married in St. Andrew’s Church on
Fifth Avenue at 127th Street.

Brothers Frank and Edwin Zittel purchased the house the next
year, converting it to spacious, high-end apartments. William F. Heide was a candy manufacturer who
lived here at the time; his apartment consisted of ten rooms.

photo by Alice Lum

Throughout the rest of the 20th century the house
would see numerous owners or leasers. In
April 1937 Max Berkowitz leased the building; in 1941 the lease and furnishings
were sold by John Yezdimer to Louise Schwartz; and four years later the house
was purchased by Elizabeth Wolfson.

In 1958 Ms. Wolfson sold the house to F. Morse Brown who
converted it to one apartment on the first and second stories; three each on
the third and fourth floor, and two apartments on the fifth floor.

The distinguished home at the corner of West End Avenue and
West 91st Street is remarkably unchanged today—a dignified reminder
of a time on the Upper West Side when capacious mansions sheltered wealthy
urban pioneers.

Monday, June 25, 2012

Eckford's pastoral grounds would not last long; replaced by the bustling Chelsea neighborhood.--print NYPL Collection from D. T. Valentine's Manual of 1860

At only 16 years of age, Scottish-born Henry Eckford was placed with a naval ship builder in Quebec where he learned the craft. By the time he came to the United States, ten years after the signing of the Declaration of Independence, he was 21 years old and was aware of highly-important improvements in ship design and
construction. Almost immediately he took
the lead in the New York ship-building industry as his vessels were stronger
and speedier than those of his competitors.

During the War of 1812 he rose to national prominence
through his contracts for building U.S. Naval vessels for the Great Lakes. Afterward, in 1822, he built the steamer Robert
Fulton—the first steam vessel to make the voyage from New York to New Orleans
and Havanna.

Eckford’s fortune grew and he lived in a fine Federal-style
home on Water Street, near the homestead of Henry Bergh, another ship
builder. Not far away were the shipyards on the East
River, extending as far as 13th Street. Valentine’s Manual of Old New York in 1916
would recall that “At the immense fire place (it was so large that a man could
easily sit in the chimney) in the Bergh house Henry Eckford was a frequent
visitor. Indeed, Bergh’s principal
amusement was in going to see Eckford, and Eckford’s principal amusement in
going to see Bergh.”

In 1820 Eckford was appointed naval constructor. Working at the Brooklyn Naval Yards, he
designed warships which were considered, according to “Appleton’s Cyclopaedia
of American Biography,” “the finest in the world.”

Henry Eckford in a painting reproduced years later by Harper's New Monthly Magazine

A falling-out with the naval commissioners led to Eckford’s
resignation and his designing of military vessels for European and South
American countries, including Brazil and Venezuela.

Wealthy New Yorkers in the first decades of the 19th
century still maintained sprawling country estates north of the city. Continuing the tradition and asserting his
position in society, Henry Eckford purchased 22.6 acres from Clement C. Moore
in November 1824. Eckford paid the
astounding sum of $22,000 for the portion of Moore’s ancestral estate of
Chelsea, The property stretched from
what now is 7th Avenue to 8th Avenue, from about 21st
to 26th Streets.

Friends of the ship architect were somewhat surprised at the
purchase. The area was low-lying and
retained water, “so much so that the location as a residence was unhealthy,”
said historian Charles Haynes Haswell in 1896.
His friends teased him about his “cow pasture” and asked if he intended
to raise frogs there.

Despite the banter, Eckford built a large home on a raised
plot of ground, surrounded by breeze-catching porches. American Architect and Architecture would
later remember that “One reached this ample villa, a building like the old
plantation houses down South, by Love Lane, a road that turned toward the
Hudson from Broadway.” The house was
never named, but was generally called The Love Lane House.

The residence was entered through a central doorway above a
broad flight of steps from the lawn. The
two identical wings on either side of the central portion with their peaked
roofs made the house look, from the road, like two identical homes.

Eminent thinkers of the day were guests here, such as
inventor Robert Fulton. But writers and poets, whom Eckford found most interesting, were most often found in the parlor and dining room. The New York Times said, on November 14,
1920, “During Mr. Eckford’s occupancy of the home it was frequented by some of
the best-known literary lights in the city, including the poet, Fitz-Greene
Halleck, James Rodman Drake…Charles P. Clinch, the author and early in life
private secretary of Mr. Eckford and Dr. James E. DeKay, the eminent
Naturalist.”

Harper’s New Monthly Magazine agreed, saying that “Many
jovial evenings were spent by these young gentlemen under the roof of the rich
Scotch ship-builder, and two of the number became his sons-in-law.”

Inventor Robert Fulton painted a portrait of Henry Eckford--NYPL Collection

Indeed, James Rodman Drake married Eckford’s daughter, Sarah,
making the summer house even more of a magnet for the literati of the day. Dr.
DeKay would marry the other daughter, Janet.

Despite the “jovial evenings,” the house on Love Lane would
also be a place of tragedy and sorrow.

Joseph Rodman Drake died of consumption at the age of 25, leaving
Sarah a young widow. One evening while
suffering from a fever, she rested before a fireplace at the Love Lane
home. Sleeping in another room was her
brother, John, who had just returned from abroad.

A spark from a crackling log erupted from the
fireplace. Sarah awoke to find her
clothing in flames. Panicked, she rushed
into her brother’s bedroom. John agitatedly
tried to extinguish the fire with his bare hands, but it was too late.

Sarah died and John’s extensive burns led to serious
infections that eventually killed him.

Henry Eckford busied himself with the reorganization of the
United States Navy for President Andrew Jackson; then prepared a publication on
Naval Architecture. Around the same
time he donated $20,000 to establish a professorship of Naval Architecture at
Columbia College.

In 1831 his talents were brought to the attention of Sultan
Mahmoud of the Ottoman Empire, who commissioned Eckford to build a
sloop-of-war. Afterwards, he was given
the office of Chief Naval Constructor for the Empire. A year later he traveled to Turkey where he
established a navy yard, but then suddenly on November 12 at the age of 57--just
as he was about to be made a Bey of the Empire-- he died.

The house on Love Lane became the object of long legal
battles. Eckford’s detailed will had not
been updated to remove the several members of his family who had died since it
was written. Finally, on May 30, 1839 an
auction was held of the estate—what was now 161 city lots. Charles Haynes Haswell noted in his diary
that day “This sale gave an average of a little in excess of fifty dollars per
city lot.”

A "Mr. Hone" disagreed with the accounting, saying that the
lots “brought very big prices, a total of $224,045, averaging over $1,500 a
lot.”

The country mansion held the least interest to the property buyers. Streets and avenues were
advancing northward and the potential land values for development were now more
important than rural estates. Before
long Love Lane would be straightened and renamed 21st Street.

When 25th Street was laid out, it cut off the
southern portion of the house. And
before long the rest was gone as well. The attractive house with the wide verandas lasted less than
three decades. Its jovial evenings and
tragic events came and went without a trace.

Saturday, June 23, 2012

Before the end of the Civil War, New
York City’s fire fighting relied on a relatively disorganized assortment of
volunteer companies. Young men, most
of whom had other, paying, occupations, joined their neighborhood fire companies,
becoming “laddies.” When a fire broke
out, the alarm sent the men scrambling to the fire houses and companies would
vie with one another to arrive at the blaze first, or become the most skilled
at putting fires out.

The fire houses doubled as social
clubs for the men who were often boisterous and rowdy. But the services of the companies were
invaluable to the merchants and residents of the neighborhood.

By the 1840s Greenwich Village had
burgeoned from a sleepy hamlet north of the city to a thriving community. Rowhouses in the Federal style of a
generation earlier were being upstaged by wide Greek Revival or Anglo-Italianate
homes. The need for a fire house was clear.

At the gentle curve of Barrow Street
just west of Bedford Street a new building was constructed around 1843 for Empire Hose
Company No. 40. While many
of the fire houses of this period were vernacular, no-nonsense brick
structures, this one went a step further.
The red brick building with
brownstone trim smacked of the newly-popular Anglo-Italianate style. The centered, arched carriage entrance beneath
a stone cornice was framed in brownstone.
The carved, faceted keystones at street level and at the third floor
were an added touch of sophistication to the handsome four-story
structure. Unusually tall windows, deft brickwork
and a deeply-overhanging cornice set the fire house apart from the norm.

The brownstone of the cornice and other trim gently contrasted with the red brick structure.

Two of the fire fighters lived
full-time in the station. In 1857 they
were John H. Read, a gasfitter by profession, and Alexander Kimburgh, a “cartman”
or deliveryman. The Company had an enviable fire “carriage”
built just two years earlier by the respected carriage and fire equipment
makers, Pine & Hartshorn.

At the time there were 30 members of
Empire Hose Company No. 40. But an
inspection that year by the Board of Aldermen called the house “in bad
condition and too small.” The inspector did note, however, that the company had 1000 feet of hose, “all of which is good.”

Year after year the city sent
inspectors and despite the attractive architecture of the fire station, the
evaluation was always the same. In 1862
the inspector wrote down again “House in bad order.”
The fire fighters maintained their fire truck well, however; for just as
the station was always found lacking, the carriage was always listed “in good
condition.” Nevertheless that year the
company acquired a new carriage “built by Charles E. Hartshorn," according to the inspection papers.

Blind recesses in the brickwork create spandrels and visual interest--an extra touch by the architect.

In 1865 the two volunteers who lived
upstairs were T. F. West, a painter, and J. Dealy, another cartman. The Company was down to 23 men and, happily
for them, the inspector rated the house as “in good condition.” Not that it would long matter.

That year reformers pressed the State
Assembly to organize a professional, unified fire department. A highly-publicized fire destroyed Barnum’s
Museum later that year added to the pressure and the Act of 1865 was
enacted. It established the “Metropolitan
District” fire department—a paid force that merged Brooklyn’s and New York’s firefighting
efforts and eliminated the scattered volunteer groups.

The second half of the 19th
century saw a distinct change in Greenwich Village. Several
sections were now lined with squalid tenements filled with desperately
impoverished immigrants. While most
streets remained respectable and safe, some harbored “vile dens” where crime
and degraded women could be found.

Religious reformers attacked sin with
gusto and the fire house at No. 70 Barrow became the Gospel Mission. It was here on September 29, 1878 that the
energetic Dr. D. J. Lyster preached on the subject of “The Angelic Study of the
Gospel.”

The building was purchased by
brothers Adolph and Aaron Weiss in 1926 and for half a century it would be home
to various small manufacturers and businesses.
Then in 1971 it was converted to residential apartments.

The large double carriage doors are
long gone and the carriage entrance has been bricked half-way up to create a
window; but overall the handsome brick building that was home to fire laddies
and missionaries survives handsomely intact.